


Resolution

by argylsocks



Category: Young Justice
Genre: Endgame, Gen, Implied Relationships, Major character death - Freeform, Post-Invasion, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-15
Updated: 2013-03-15
Packaged: 2017-12-05 08:47:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/721151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/argylsocks/pseuds/argylsocks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All things, good or bad, come to an end.</p>
<p>Originally posted on 2/3/13 at http://argylrefs.tumblr.com/post/42176704709/resolution</p>
            </blockquote>





	Resolution

**Author's Note:**

> Got a little iffy towards the end…But I’m kinda happy with it? Birthday present to myself. And I managed to fit in an explosion! :D Also, kinda good practice working with a large group? Idk.

Only a few had heard that hollow and rhythmic sound before, with Artemis and the odd civilian or two. Even then, it was almost something expected, a contingency plan just in case that margin of error came true.

But now? Now there was a true element of panic as the others watched Conner tried to breathe life back into his fallen teammate.

Dick’s plan—he really shouldn’t think of it like that, turns out Kaldur was the one who pushed the hardest for it—had its faults. There were so many moments where it went wrong, when they thought it couldn’t get any worse.

Artemis’s staged death.

The destruction of the Cave.

The HQ in D.C.

Kaldur being essentially wiped away and M’gann’s resulting guilt.

And then the rest of the team found out, when it got to the endgame. Some yelled, raging at the thought that the mentor they trusted the most, the one who told cheesy jokes and made lame puns, the one who always told them that they could come to him if they needed someone to talk to, didn’t trust them enough to let them know something so important.

Then there was La’gaan who, much to everyone’s surprise, told everyone else to shut their mouths and _think_ about it. He made a good point.

Dick didn’t say anything while the rest of the team fought amongst themselves or the more senior members—the first members—looked on with varying degrees of coldness on their faces.

But Conner heard his heartbeat slow and his breathing even as the kids realized that yeah, it was messed up and, yeah, it needlessly put their friends’ safety at risk _but it worked._

So how did everything go wrong again? Looking back, Conner decided that it was always some unknown element, something that _no one_ , not even the Bat himself or probably the entire League, could’ve prepared for that made Dick and Kal’s plan go awry.

Deathstroke and the entire Sportsmaster issue was one of them. M’gann not knowing about the plan in the first place was actually the first. (Conner was just hoping that someday, maybe decades in the future when everyone else was old and wrinkly and he still looked as strong as he did when they first got him _out_ of that damned tube, they could, all of them and maybe even future members, look back on this and laugh about it and all the other things they’d gotten up to.) And then the hostile aliens.

He saw how even the best of plans, which he had to admit, this operation didn’t even come close to being on the list, could’ve fallen apart under conditions like that.

So he shouldn’t have been surprised when the endgame came and they played their last cards and made their final bet.

For the first time in what seemed like millennia, everything was going right.

Sabotage, divide and conquer, regroup and reclaim the remains.

That was it. Admittedly, the Reach apocalypse and the Light’s plan complicated the actual execution somewhat, but it was theoretically manageable.

Wally even cracked a lame joke, clapping his friend on the back as he did. “Looks like we’re feelin’ the aster again, like in the good old days. Right, Nightwing?”

He and the rest of the seniors were finishing their own tasks, part of which involving recovering Artemis and Kaldur, when they heard the news: the GLs had _somehow_ managed to get whoever was on Oa to send reinforcements and the “criminal” Leaguers had returned. The Reach had been turned back, driven off world, yet most of the Light had escaped custody.

They shuffled—some with support, others providing it—into the halo of their former home where some freshmen—juniors, really—had already begun to gather.

Robin was there, holding an old, dull disc. Gar lay on the ground in front of him, spread out as if he was trying to touch the four corners with his eyes closed. His tail brushed against Robin’s ankles, bare from some unseen flame’s touch, earning him a kick in the trunk as Robin flinched. They looked at each other and laughed. Robin set the disc aside and took his mask off, then lay down next to Gar, idly pointing out the barely identifiable clouds in the dawning sky.

M’gann took La’gaan by the hand and pulled him around a piece of rubble.

Wally and Artemis didn’t even make it out of the Bioship.

As they walked past, Jaime looked up from where he and Bart leaned against each other’s back, propping themselves up right at where the main entrance used to be.

“There’s…you know what? I don’t even know. Bart, tell ‘em.”

Bart gazed up at them, yawning and rubbing his eyes. “There’s. Um. There’s a Reach thing that might still be on mode over in the water. ‘Stoo big for us to do anything about it,” he mumbled, his bare hand flopping down with a sharp crack against Jaime’s armored one. Shaking his head, he managed to utter something along the lines of “I don’t even care” before his head bobbed down to his chest, Jaime’s _Sorry,_ ésé, lost to sleep.

Conner met Dick’s eyes through the cracked mask. Gesturing to the unconscious Kaldur slumped across his back, he said, “I take care of Kal, you handle the UXO?”

“Sure.” He was already bounding off, kit in hand.

Chuckling, then wincing, Conner squatted to brace Kaldur against a low wall and sat next to him. He closed his eyes and breathed, telling himself that he was just waiting for Kal to wake up and that he wasn’t taking relaxing because they were still technically on a mission.

They stayed like that until he lost track of time and Kaldur started twitching against him.

Conner blindly reached for the nearby water pack before handing it to Kaldur. He didn’t open his eyes until something inside him started nagging him about the time and water splattered against the ground.

Kaldur’s voice was as soft as it ever was when he spoke. “It is…interesting how everything ends where we began, isn’t it?” He was curled up in a loose bundle of Kaldur, right down to that faintly broken look in his face, as Conner stared at him.

“…Sure is.”

There was a brief silence before Kaldur continued. “Where is Nightwing? I…I should debrief him on what’s happened.”

Conner snorted. “I don’t think you’ll have to worry about that for a while. And Dick’s off disarming Reach tech.”

“Dick?” Kaldur asked with a smirk pulling his face taut. “Isn’t that a term for…”

“Go ahead and laugh. We all did.”

“No, I think I’ll wait until he comes back.”

They were about to laugh, halfway through breathing, when a flash of orange light and a wave of heat washed over them, followed almost immediately by a loud _boom_. The ground shook, making them huddle against the ground as what rubble still stood collapsed around them.

The entire explosion lasted maybe five seconds.

It seemed longer, definitely was longer, as Conner scrambled to his feet and ran to the bay. He froze, breathing heavily, when he reached the explosion’s origin.

The Reach bomb smoldered in a blackened heap, dry heat still radiating off it. Twisted shards and strips of metal and alien tech littered the sand and water around it, creating a near jungle of shrapnel.

He pushed the sickening, sinking stone in his stomach away as sand-muffled footsteps ran towards him.

“Superboy, wh-what happened?” He didn’t know who asked it.

_Stop_ panicking! he told himself. “UXO exploded.” He pressed the button on the comm in his ear and opened the communication channel. “Nightwing, come in.” Static. “Nightwing, what’s your status?”

“Boss!” Bart called from a few yards away. He was waving something in his hand.

And from the comm.

“Fliers on Alpha. I need an aerial report—blast radius, damage, anything. M’gann, La’gaan, you’re Beta, in the water. There might be Reach tech. Kaldur, too, if you can manage it. Everyone who can is on Delta with me. We’re looking for Nightwing. Call me as soon as you find anything. The rest of you, go back to base camp and rest. Split up and deploy.”

_Telepathic link is open._

_Thanks._

They sifted through the rubble, trying not to burn their hands or injure themselves further, for hours. More team members trickled by, informed of the new objective and delegating themselves to their squads.

The sun was setting when the League came by with floodlights.

After almost twelve hours of searching, Mal shouted.

Conner ran.

How the bomb had blown Dick this far out was lost on him. In the dim light, Conner could tell there was a dark smear across the black Kevlar suit and the grey sand was stained beneath his body and along the path that had been made when Mal pulled him out of the surf. Dick’s arm was definitely broken, as well as at least one of his legs.

He couldn’t hear a heartbeat.

“Give me some light!” Conner shouted as he started compressing his chest. Someone dropped silently next to where he crouched and a thick black glove slipped a breathing mask over Dick’s face.

Conner glanced over briefly.

One of Batman’s wide hands covered his face while the other held the breathing mask in place. His tense shoulders shook silently.

Conner tried harder, ignoring the hollow sound that came from Dick’s chest.

Batman’s hand stopped him moments later. Raising his head in protest, Conner met the older man’s eyes.

Nodding slightly, he looked back down. Dick’s hair was still sopping wet, curling against the clammy skin of his forehead.

“Calling it. 7:23 p.m. Nightwing. Killed in action.”


End file.
